Lebanese Doctor with valid U.S. visa deported to Lebanon
A federal judge wants to know why a doctor from Lebanon with a U.S. visa was deported, after he ordered that she not be removed until he could hear her case.
Dr. Rasha Alawieh, 34, had been granted the visa on March 11 and arrived at Boston Logan International Airport on Thursday, according to a complaint filed on her behalf by a cousin in federal court.
Alawieh, who had worked and lived in Rhode Island previously, was detained at least 36 hours, through Friday, and was going to be sent back to Lebanon, the complaint said. Alawieh, a kidney transplant specialist, was to start work at Brown University as an assistant professor of medicine.
U.S. District Judge Leo Sorokin issued an order on Friday that an in-person hearing be scheduled Monday, with Alawieh brought to court.
"Whether or not she is in custody of the United States, the court anticipates proceeding with this hearing," he wrote.
But by Saturday, the cousin filed a motion that customs officials "willfully" disobeyed the order by sending Alawieh back to Lebanon.
Sorokin gave the government until Monday morning to respond, prior to the start of the scheduled 10 a.m. hearing. The government's response was not publicly available.
Alawieh has worked at Brown prior to the issuance of her H1B visa, the complaint said. It said she has held fellowships and residencies at three universities in the United States.
A spokesperson for Brown said Alawieh is an employee of Brown Medicine with a clinical appointment to Brown.
Brown Medicine is a not-for-profit medical practice that is its own organization and serves its own patients directly. It is affiliated with Brown University's medical school.
17 March 2025, 17:52
03
Since Dr Alawieh phone pictures shows she sympathizes with Hizb (Iran Foreign Legion), and there are many Hizb injured from pagers and war, her duty is to volunteer to help heal her wounded community members instead of running to the US to make fortune in US hospitals while her community suffers and Lebanese tax payers are left with Hizbollah medical bills. This is in addition to $15 billion in was damage ($15,000 per Lebanese taxpayer) and the hundreds of billion in HizbIran direct and indirect economic damage to Lebanon since they assassinated Hariri and their 2006 War to transform Lebanon into an Irainan rocket base and brainwash their community into Basij converts stranger to their own culture and traditions transforming Lebanon from the City of the hill into a beggar bankrupt nation with no dignity or hope where all institution occupied by the Basij, spending billions on arms and tunnels while most people can’t afford food or medicine.
